The two-day 2016 Aussie Millions Poker Championship A$25,000 Challenge saw 122 entries contending for a share of the prize pool of nearly A$3 million. However, it was Chance Kornuth who emerged victorious to collect A$790,560 in prize money, his second biggest career live cash, and the exclusive Aussie Millions ring.
As mentioned above, as many as 122 entries, of whom 100 unique ones, paid the A$25,000 buy-in to enter the exciting high roller tournament. A prize pool of A$2,928,000 was created and the top 14 finishers received a portion of it, with payouts starting from A$58,560.
As many as 26 players returned for Day 2 of the event to play down to a seven-handed final table and eventually to a champion. And the final table was reached in Level 18 with Australian Michael Egan as the chip leader. The player had a total of 1,635,000 in chips at the beginning of seven-handed play. And Kornuth was the short stack with 397,000.
The first final-table elimination came in Level 20 and it was Egan himself who hit the rail. The player was busted by American Jason Les to collect the amount of A$131,760. Phanlert Sukonthachartnant from Thailand was the next to leave after he could not make it against Steve O’Dwyer. The player received A$131,760 for his 6th place in the tournament.
Shortly after, Kornuth eliminated UK-based player Oliver Price. The latter took home A$190,320 for his efforts. It took some time before O’Dwyer hit the rail in 4th place. The player was defeated by Russian Igor Kurganov and scooped A$263,520 for his fourth-place finish in the tournament. Jason Les was then eliminated in 3rd place by Kornuth. He collected A$351,360.
The heads-up match between Kurganov and Kornuth started with the first holding the majority of chips. The final two-handed duel took about two hours for the name of the winner to be determined. The last hand for the tournament occurred in Level 23. Kurganov raised to 100,000 from the button and Kornuth called. The flop came [6c][5s][7d]. Kornuth then checked to see Kurganov bet 170,000. Kornuth raised all in and the Russian called almost immediately.
Kornuth tabled [7c][3c] and Kurganov turned [6h][Ah]. The [9d] appeared on the turn and the [4d] came on the river. Neither was of any help to the Russian and he had to content himself with the runner-up finish in the tournament and the amount of A$541,680.
As for Kornuth, this was his third cash during this year’s edition of the Aussie Millions. A few days ago, the American player collected A$4,520 for finishing 8th in the A$1,150 No-Limit Hold’em Shot Clock Shootout and A$9,415 for his 9th place in the A$1,150 No-Limit Hold’em Six Max. Earlier this month, he took 3rd place in the PCA $10,000 Main Event for a payout of $641,140. Including last night’s triumph, Kornuth’s live tournament earnings now amount to more than $3.3 million.
